Comment Re:It's easy (Score 1) 467
That there is the true secret to my success.
That there is the true secret to my success.
I've tried duct tape art, a web game, a book, and a dot-com startup, but no apps yet. I think that's next of my checklist of educational monetary failures, though. If they say you've got to try seven businesses before one becomes successful*, I've only got three more to go before I hit it big.
Would you like to elaborate on why you don't like them? Or what you using as an investment vehicle instead?
He also neglected to include any sort of interest/growth in that calculation. You could easily get there in much less time at $25k/year with even 5% interest. Or some problems come up and it takes you 30 years instead of 25 - that's still shorter than most people work. Or get a few raises and work your way up to contributing $50k/year in a decade.
In other words, there are obstacles, but there's plenty of wiggle room in both directions. If you're paying even a little attention, it's not a hard goal to hit with a developer's salary, which is generally considerably above median income.
Really? I think most people would accept "net worth" as the proper metric.
Now there's probably some who don't think about that much and assume millionaires have tons of cash on hand and spend wildly, but generally you don't get to be (or stay) a millionaire doing that.
If a wooden block can be a car and a stick can be a gun, I'm gonna call shenanigans on this. It's not a limitation of the specialty pieces, but of the imagination.
Survival of the fittest is the only rule in life.
Don't be silly. Survival of the fittest applies to the wild. The entire *point* of culture/civilization is to blunt that harshest of rules. It doesn't always work so well, and it can easily be exploited, but the GP is entirely correct when he says that bullying should be treated as wrong and discouraged.
4. When their quota/sales target is not met, developers/publishers are under pressure to make up the difference.
5. One of the easiest ways to boost sales is to introduce items which will confer a greatly desired benefit on its purchasers. OTOH, non-buyers who cannot enjoy the greatly desired benefit will endure a comparatively degraded playing experience.
These two aren't necessarily true.
4. Smaller developers especially may not have things like quotas and sales targets which dictate their entire behavior. They're also more likely to be developing for fun as much as income such that $$ aren't the only consideration. And they're more likely to pick free to play as a model just because nobody will pay up front for a game/company they've never heard of.
5. There are plenty of ways around this. Many games don't even require direct player-to-player competition. You can also segregate players so that payers and non-payers can compete in different tiers, or allow modes of gameplay which exclude or dampen the benefits of "pay to win" items. You can even allow ways for non-playing players to gain the same benefits, but in ways that are inconvenient enough the really dedicated will do it, while some others will decide they'd rather pay than put in the effort.
Thanks for the discussion about Hearthstone. I hadn't heard about it, but it's been fun. I played a little Magic back in the 90's and miss that style of game. Free is an excellent price for a little dabbling.
Also, PvZ2 includes a lot of components that you cannot eventually earn, but can only buy. A handful of plants, a number of other bonuses. I added it all up at one point, and it was well over $50, just for the perpetual benefits, not even consumables. I resist paying that much for an AAA title. No way in hell will I pay it for a little iPhone distracter. I was late to the original and only paid $5, which I thought was fair. I'd pay $5 or even $10 for everything in #2. But not $50 or $60. Ridiculous.
Sure, I understand the double-blind system. But it's not placebo vs. actual medicine, it's placebo vs (medicine + placebo.) Outside of the study, when your doctor gives you a pill, you're not only getting the full benefit of the medicine, but also the psychological benefits of the placebo effect. It's *not* a placebo, but your brain is still telling you that you feel better for the same reasons, and any treatment you get should automatically convey those benefits.
I acknowledge your point about side effects - there's a greater chance of negatives, which could balance out some positives.
I thought it wasn't just lack of mastery, but actually poor controls, which contributed to the inability to master it. This isn't a sad movie making you sad, this is a skipping DVD during a crucial movie scene inducing rage when you can't get it to work.
ET was bad, but not even in the same league as Ghosts 'n' Goblins.
I still remember the one and only time I beat the original Castlevania. Only time I made it past the Reaper, actually, with some kind of luck. From there the run to Dracula wasn't bad, but I had to retry that boss fight dozens of times. It took so many times I had to pause the game and leave it running overnight and keep trying after school the next day. Finally only beat him by accident, I think, which involved getting hit at a weird point and landing somewhere I didn't expect to be, but running with it. Perhaps the crowning achievement of my NES days.
I have long maintained that if you could induce the placebo effect 50% of the time you'd be doing better than modern medicine.
Don't you think modern medicine should have just as much of a chance of tapping into the placebo effect as anything else?
The one day you'd sell your soul for something, souls are a glut.